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Nearly 70% of Iranian wetlands dried

Society Materials 17 February 2015 17:00 (UTC +04:00)
About 67 percent of Iranian wetlands’ area is dried, Masoud Bagherzadeh Karimi, deputy head of Iran ’s environment protection organization said.
Nearly 70% of Iranian wetlands dried

Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 17

By Umid Niayesh - Trend:

About 67 percent of Iranian wetlands' area is dried, Masoud Bagherzadeh Karimi, deputy head of Iran 's environment protection organization said.

The country's wetlands' total area was about three million hectares of that only 33 percent remains currently, Bagherzadeh Karimi said, Iran 's ILNA news agency reported Feb. 17.

Excessive dam reservoirs' construction is the main reason behind drying of the wetlands, the official said, adding decrease in precipitation and temperature rise also intensified the crisis.

"In the most pessimistic condition we are allowed to use only 50 percent of water sources from nature, whereas now it amounts to 90 percent," Bagherzadeh Karimi said.

"We have no choice, but returning the nature's share of water to resolve the crisis," he added.

The Islamic Republic is located in an arid zone and the country faces a serious water shortage crisis. However, many experts believe that the current water shortage problem is a result of water resources mismanagement, rather than the drought.

Iran's total annual water consumption is approximately 93 billion cubic meters, out of which about 92 percent is used in agriculture (86 billion cubic meters), 6.6 percent in municipality (6.18 billion cubic meters), and 1.2 percent in industry (1.12 billion cubic meters), according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Up to 70 percent of water used in the agriculture sector is being wasted, Iranian officials say.

Edited by CN

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